Reichenbach Falls

My recent posts (this one and that one, more specifically) about Sherlock Holmes reminded me that there is one place of pilgrimage every Holmes fan, or indeed every crime fiction fan should visit. I am talking of course of the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland, the place where the greatest detectivemet his"death" during the events of The Final Problem. It happened on the 4th of May 1891. Switzerland is in my list of countries to visit or, in this case, revisit, for many, many reasons. Maybe when or if it happens, we should make a stop there. It could be fun. Sometimes I find the association of places with legendary or fictitious events to be more interesting than historical ones. And if you have even been there, please tell me in the comments. I'd like to know about your experience.

I missed Sherlock Holmes Day!

 I learned recently, but too late, that the 22nd of May was Sherlock Holmes Day. Which corresponds to the birthday of his creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It is kind of ironic, given how much he ended up loathing Sherlock Holmes. And now his birthday has been hijacked by his most famous creation. I feel sorry for him, to be honest. I guess if he'd known he'd... cry all his way to the bank. Anyway, I first thought it was the 30th, because the Facebook page of the British Museum made me aware of the Day on the 30th. I thought it had something to do with the anniversary of Holmes' "death" in The Final Problem. Anyway, I should blog some more in the upcoming days about this short story. And, while I did not observe Sherlock Holmes Day, there is one Holmes novel I hope to read before the end of summertime. And I have now put it as a special yearly event in my calendar.

The Valley of Fear to explore

I am not a regular reader of Sherlock Holmes, but I should be, especially since I love the character and it's always a fun read. Be that as it may, from time to time, I read or reread his stories. There was one book I had always wanted to get my hands on: The Valley of Fear, so far the only cannonical Holmes novel I haven't read yet (for the short stories, that's a diffeent matter). And I couldn't find it anywhere! Well, thanks to my local bookshop, this is no longer a problem: they ordered it for me and I now am the happy owner of this (maybe lesser known?) classic. I know close to nothing about the plot, only that Professor Moriarty is featured in it. And that's enough to make it a worthy read, the Napoleon of crime being rather elusive in the original canon. And because I have a bit of an obsession for Moriarty. Anyway, I am reading something else now, but The Valley of Fear is the next crime fiction title I will explore.

Pr. Moriarty (the grandfather of all modern villains?)

I have been wanting to rediscover Sherlock Holmes recently, I don't know why. I haven't read a Sherlock Holmes story since 2009, I think. And I suddenly got in the mood to read some. I might borrow a book or two at the library (yes, I know they are online, but I don't want to read it online). Sherlock Holmes is, after all, the grandfather of all modern detectives, whether they are private or from the police force. That said, I think my interest is not so much about Holmes as it is about his nemesis, Professor Moriarty, the "Napoleon of crime". I know he was never really conceived as his nemesis by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who simply invented him in The Adventure of the Final Problem to find a worthy adversary to kill his cumbersome creation. He is then mentioned in other short stories, and I believe I read them all, but I did not read yet The Valley of Fear, in which he plays a role in the plot. This is going to be my next Sherlock Holmes story, I think.

Why am I so interested by this villain, who is relatively unimportant in Holmes' canon and whose background is inconsistent? Not because of its posthumous fame, when he became, outside the canon, Holmes' archenemy. But because I believe that Doyle created the grandfather of all modern villains, maybe more than Holmes was ever the grandfather of modern heroes. Moriarty was a gang leader whose rarely, if ever, gets his hands dirty, an evil genius, he was also a bit of a mad scientist before his time (as he was a mathematician). His bastard sons are numerous. Among them: Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Alain Charnier and the Greeks in The Wire. While heroes in crime fiction have become ordinary men, often intelligent but not to the point of turning into the almost inhuman thinking machine Holmes often was, there are still, even in modern fiction, evil men of exceptional nature like Moriarty. Yes, there are plenty of thugs, low-mind brutes, but even in modern crime fiction, even in realistic shows like The Wire, the exceptional criminal shows up. Crime fiction is a genre where there are still many Napoleons of crime.